ABC and The CW commit to competing Beauty And The Beast pilots, as the gypsy's curse demands

It’s barely been a week since The CW confirmed a pilot pickup for its revamped version of ’80s drama Beauty And The Beast, and so—as the cackling gypsies decreed—a competing Beauty And The Beast project must be hatched before the moon fully reaches its next phase, lest the soil turn sour and the cows begin milking rusty blood. Fortunately we have all been saved from dying twisted, vulture-pecked skeletons by ABC, who has just similarly given a pilot order to its own previously announced Beauty And The Beast project from Jericho and Human Target writer Jonathan E. Steinberg. Inspired by both a will to live and its current hit Once Upon A Time, ABC’s Beauty And The Beast is described as a “reimagining of the classic fairy tale set in a mythical, dangerous world,” but hews relatively more faithfully to the story of a “a beautiful and tough princess” and her unexpected commingling with a beast. Relative, anyway, to The CW’s Beauty And The Beast, its "procedural spin," and its exploration of the mythical, dangerous world of the New York City sewer system.

Anyway, both projects are currently moving ahead with pilot orders, ignoring the omens of the disappointing performances of last year’s Beastly and this month’s Beauty And The Beast 3-D that would suggest America is all good on Beauty And The Beast stories right now, thanks. But what America wants and what America needs are two different things—and if you think you’re tired of fairy tale adaptations now, just wait until you collapse from starvation.